Return to David's theory of evolution, purpose & theodicy (Evolution)

by dhw, Thursday, June 06, 2024, 12:50 (168 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: I've been working from memory. In his book directly: there is no rational necessity for God to be morally good, just or merciful. or even benevolently disposed toward us. Allegory must always be used for words about God. Divine inscrutability precludes us from ever asking the reason why God does anything. God is no way necessitated to create the universe and must be considered as acting freely. I've interpreted him based on these thoughts basically quoted.

dhw: Then I’m delighted to say I agree with Adler, except for this silly use of the word “allegory”, when WE know the meaning of our words, and the question is whether they do or don’t apply to God

DAVID: Adler insists upon allegory!!! His God is all everything. And His purpose was defined in Adler's book: "The difference in Man and the Diffrenceit Makes", that is a proof of God because humans are so unusual. You don't know Adler.

Our discussions concerning your God’s possible purposes, methods and nature should be based on your beliefs, not on what Adler does or doesn’t say, but most of what YOU say is clearly not supported by Adler. I have, however, long since agreed that the design theory provides a good case for the existence of God. You don’t need human “unusualness” for that, since the complexities of all living organisms are such that they appear to be designed. We have dealt with “allegory” before, and you agreed that the question is not the meaning of the words we use, but whether they apply to God. “All everything” tells us absolutely nothing: God would then be all-good and all-evil, all-loving and all-hating, omnipotent and powerless, omniscient and totally ignorant.

dhw: It’s clear then, that Adler would oppose your 100% declarations that your God is omnipotent, omniscient, all-good, selfless, fixated on a single purpose (us plus food), the designer of 99.9% of species irrelevant to his purpose, “certainly not human in any way”. Thank you for your integrity in finally recognizing that in fact my views are far closer to Adler’s than yours are.

Not answered.

DAVID: God wanted all of evolution as it happened, because it produced all of the organisms humans can use. You are purposely blind to this purpose.

dhw: You agreed long ago that “all of evolution” did not produce humans or our food. 99.9% of evolution had no connection with us and our food. “You are purposely blind” to your agreement, as follows:

dhw: Do you believe that we and our food are directly descended from 99.9% of all creatures that ever lived?

DAVID: No. From the 0.1% surviving.

dhw: Hence the absurdity of your theory bolded above, and your ridicule of your God’s imperfect, inefficient method of fulfilling the purpose you impose on him.

DAVID: More nonsense. The 0.1% required the 99.9% to go extinct!!! Pure Raup.

You keep hiding behind Adler and Raup, even though they don’t support you! You have told us that Raup’s point is that extinctions are important because evolution progresses through new conditions which cause the extinction of the 99.9%. These trigger the arrival of new species that evolve from the 0.1% of survivors. All a matter of luck. Nothing to do with your God deliberately designing and culling 99.9% of failures in order to produce humans plus food, because he inherited some idiotic rule that made him do it that way!

DAVID (under “stromatolites) : Not luck if by design.

dhw: If your God wanted a free-for-all, he would have designed the conditions that would lead to a free-for-all. Survival by luck (Raup) does not mean survival by design (Turell).

DAVID: God does not deal in Raupian luck.

And Raup does not deal in godly design, so please stop distorting his theory, and once again, please stop denying your own agreement that we and our food are NOT descended from the 99.9% of species that ever lived.

Evolution

DAVID: Your alternative views of God's evolution turn it into a goal-less free-for-all for God's entertainment.
And:
DAVID: You totally humanize God, for no good reason.

dhw: The concept of an eternal, immaterial, immortal, sourceless mind can hardly be “totally human” just because it might have invented evolution as a free-for-all or a series of experiments. You impose on it a single purpose and an imperfect, inefficient method of achieving that purpose for no good reason, and indeed for no reason at all that you can think of.

DAVID: Listen to Adler!! "Divine inscrutability precludes us from ever asking the reason why God does anything".

So please stop telling us that your God’s one and only reason for creating life was to design us and our food, and his reason for designing 99.9 out of 100 species irrelevant to this purpose was that he was obeying some law which he “inherited”, although as first cause he could only have devised any laws himself. And please stop telling us that your God is selfless and certainly not human in any way, since Adler tells you he is all everything, which must include his being 50/50 self-interested and 50/50 endowed with other human attributes (among which you include imperfection and inefficiency in the context of design).